Paleography, also spelled palaeography , study of ancient and medievalhandwriting. The term is derived from the Greek palaios (“old”) and graphein (“to write”).

Precise boundaries for paleography are hard to define. For example, epigraphy, the study of inscriptions cut on immovable objects for permanent public inspection, is related to paleography. Casual graffiti, sale or election notices as found on the walls of Pompeii, and Christian inscriptions in the Roman catacombs are likewise part of paleographical knowledge. In general, however, paleography embraces writing found principally on papyrus, parchment (vellum), and paper. Today, paleography is regarded as relating to Greek and Latin scripts with their derivatives, thus, as a rule, excluding Egyptian, Hebrew, and Middle and Far Eastern scripts. It is closely linked with diplomatic, the study of forms in which official and private documents are drawn up.

The scientific study of Latin paleography (and of diplomatics) dates from 1681, when the French monk Jean Mabillon published De Re Diplomatica, the first textbook on the subject, while his compatriot Bernard de Montfaucon performed a parallel service for Greek paleography in his Palaeographia Graeca in 1708.

The primary task of the paleographer is to read the writings of the past correctly and to assign a date and place of origin. Close acquaintance with the language of the text is a prerequisite. Help in dating is offered by changes in styles of handwriting and variations from area to area. Abbreviations in texts likewise help in dating and localization.

Types of writing materials

A paleographer must be familiar with writing materials. Any smooth surface able to accept writing has served in the past, notably, pottery fragments, animals’ shoulder blades, slabs of wood, bark, cloth, and metal.

The great writing material of the ancient world was papyrus, in use by 3500 bc. In preparing the surface, strips taken from the papyrus reed (byblos) growing in the Nile Delta were laid side by side, while other strips were laid across at right angles, and the whole impregnated with paste. After treatment a fine smooth surface was obtained. Much of the administration of the Roman Empire depended upon papyrus, in the same way that modern bureaucracies depend upon paper. Warfare and a damp climate resulted in an almost total disappearance of papyrus from Europe, though the dry (if war-scarred) sands of Egypt have preserved vast numbers of documents. Papyrus was imported into Europe from Egypt even after the fall of Rome. Chance survivals include charters of Merovingian kings in France (7th century) and business documents (5th–10th centuries) at Ravenna, the old administrative capital of the late Roman Empire.

The other great ancient writing material, still in occasional use today, is parchment, or vellum, the terms being often used interchangeably. Vellum is a term usually applied to skin from a calf (cf. veal, veau), while parchment is an expression often applied to sheepskin or goatskin. The word parchment is derived from Pergamum in Asia Minor, the ancient centre of its manufacture.

Both papyrus and parchment were expensive and were replaced for everyday use by wax tablets corresponding to today’s notebook. Tablets made of wooden blocks were hollowed out and filled with melted, often black wax. Notes were made in the hardened surface. Even documents of permanent significance, such as property conveyances, were made on wax tablets.

Because ancient writing materials were expensive, they were often reused. Papyrus presented difficulties, for ink soon bonded itself firmly into the surface. Parchment could be more readily reused, because it is tougher and can be washed or scraped clean. Many medieval monks, when short of writing materials, took ancient books to pieces, cleaned off the leaves and used them again. The original script can often be brought out under ultraviolet light. Parchments thus cleaned and freshly inscribed are called palimpsests (Greek palin, “again”; psēstos, “scraped”).

Paper is the third great writing material. In use in China at a remote period, it was employed extensively in the Arab world by the 9th century. Not in common use in Europe until the 14th century, it took over the name of the half-forgotten papyrus.

In the early classical world the standard form of book was the papyrus roll, commonly called biblion, taking its name from the material of which it was made. It consisted of papyrus sheets pasted edge to edge with a slight overlap. The text was set out in columns, drawn up at right angles to the edge of the rolls, and started at the left. The reader unrolled as he went along and at the conclusion was obliged to reroll the book. The roll was an inconvenient form of book, difficult to consult, which probably accounts for the inaccurate quotations found in early literature, caused by an author relying on his memory rather than troubling to unwind a long roll. By the time of Christ, a new form of book was coming into fashion, the codex, or book in the shape in which it is known today. The codex is almost always of parchment, since papyrus cracks when folded. The codex seems first to have been used for notebooks or account books, the conservatism of booksellers and readers ensuring the survival of the roll for centuries. The Christians popularized the codex, using it for the Gospels.

Various instruments have been used for writing. The early Egyptians used a slender rush. From about 300 bc the thicker reed pen was used. The reed was in general use in the Greco-Roman world. Metal pens, copied from the reed, were also employed. For wax tablets a stylus was used, made of wood, bone, ivory, iron, or bronze. In many northern European areas, where reeds suitable for writing purposes are not indigenous, the feather (penna) became the main writing instrument. It was usually stripped of its vanes and the quill alone used.

Lead, used in classical times for ruling guidelines in manuscripts, was used extensively in the Middle Ages for rough notes and annotations in the margins of books.

Ink has been prepared in a variety of ways. In classical times the black discharge of cuttlefish was used, as well as concoctions of soot and gum. In the Middle Ages oak apples were steeped in water with “vitriol” (ferrous sulphate) to produce ink.

The essential skill of a paleographer is the ability to recognize the numerous styles of handwriting prevalent in different ages and places. Most European scripts descend from Greek and Roman capital letters, but variations are enormous. It is a European convention that writing starts on the left at the top and works line by line down the page. An eccentricity known as boustrophedon (from Greek boustrophēdon, “following the ox furrow”), whereby alternate lines are written backward in mirror writing, occurs chiefly in very ancient inscriptions.

The Greek and Latin alphabets existed originally as capital, or majuscule, letters. The ancient Greek alphabet, as developed in chiselled inscriptions on stone or marble, served without much modification as the alphabet used in literary works written on papyrus rolls. This script, found in the oldest surviving Greek literary papyri of c. 300 bc or earlier, gave way to more rounded and elegant forms, probably developed in the Greek literary circles of Alexandria. Cursive scripts that were easier to write were developed for everyday use, for business, and to record the acts of the great bureaucracy of Egypt, where the Greeks settled in large numbers. The Greek cursive script and the formal book script greatly influenced each other, as can be seen from a vast series of cursive documents dating from the 4th century bc for about 1,000 years. Because so much material survived, early Greek cursive can be better studied than its Latin counterpart. In Greek cursive manuscripts the everyday life of ordinary people becomes a reality: they pay or fail to pay taxes, buy or sell houses, and harass civil servants with awkward demands.

A very rough division in Greek paleography may be made at around ad 300. The earlier age is called the papyrus period; and the later, the parchment or Byzantine (or Christian) period. The division, however, is imprecise, for parchment was used well before and papyrus long after this date. The change from papyrus to parchment is signaled by three great monuments of paleographical studies, the Vatican, Alexandrine, and Sinai Bibles, all on parchment and in codex form.

An alphabet of small, or minuscule, letters developed gradually and was in use by the 8th century. Numerous abbreviations exist in Greek manuscripts, though never so many as in Latin. Accents, an additional complexity, were not systematically applied before the 7th century ad.

Styles of writing

The ancient Latin alphabet of capitals (quadrata) is found in numberless inscriptions in stone and marble all over the Roman world. How far this alphabet was used for writing books is uncertain, because, though excellently adapted for incision, it is difficult to write. Some specimens of handwriting in quadrata do exist, such as 4th- or 5th-century copies of Virgil, but scholarly opinion largely regards these as abnormal productions. By the 1st century a handsome Latin alphabet existed, called rustic, based on the use of a broad pen or brush. Rustic was used for public inscriptions on walls, as in the sale and election notices found at Pompeii. Although specimens are scarce, it is likely that books were extensively written in this hand in classical times. By the 4th century another Latin alphabet existed, the script known as uncial, in the nature of a rounded form of quadrata. Uncial survived the fall of Rome and from it developed half-uncial, the ancestor of the small letters in use today.

The stately Roman scripts, quadrata, rustic, or uncial, were not used for everyday purposes, and, as in the case of Greek, a cursive, rapidly written hand arose in which letters and business documents were inscribed. This hand is found in graffiti on Pompeian walls and in wax tablets. After the disintegration of the empire, Roman cursive became the ancestor of regional hands in what are now Spain, France, and Italy.

During the flowering of Christianity and art in Ireland (c. 500–c. 1000) a beautiful “insular” script developed, which found its way into England. There, two streams of influence commingled, for from 597 Christian missionaries arrived from Rome and brought in books in uncial script. Both scripts prospered in England, though insular gradually superseded uncial.

The most successful of all scripts proved to be Caroline minuscule, which takes its name from the emperor Charlemagne (died 814), patron of scholars and scribes, under whom the script was developed. Despite its inherent superiority and clarity, it did not predominate over regional scripts until the mid-12th century, and the local hand of southern Italy (Beneventan) maintained itself for much longer.

In the 12th century, Caroline minuscule, which had undergone moderate developments, started to display more obvious changes. It compressed laterally, while its rounded strokes became stiffer and straighter as it was converted into the so-called Gothic hands—very angular in northern Europe and more rounded in Italy. A revulsion against Gothic took place in scholarly circles in Italy in the 14th and 15th centuries, and a return to models based on Caroline minuscule took place. This revived hand, called Humanistic because humanist scholars used it, was adopted by 15th-century Italian printers, whose type faces ultimately triumphed over the Gothic. (This encyclopaedia is printed in a type scarcely modified from Caroline minuscule.) Meanwhile, Caroline and Gothic scripts had produced cursive hands for quick everyday use, as in the case of the ancient Greek and Latin alphabets. These cursive scripts were used for the vast mass of business documents written in the Middle Ages.

Abbreviations

Abbreviations are the principal problem confronting paleographers. They were extensively used in Roman times by lawyers to avoid repetition of technical terms and formulas. Abbreviations fall into two classes, suspension and contraction. Suspension, omission of the end of a word and indication by a point or sign, was used in Roman public inscriptions—e.g., IMP.(ERATOR), CAES.(AR). Contraction, the omission of letters from the middle of a word and replacement by a sign or some other device, was common among Greek-speaking Jews, who contracted certain sacred or revered names, such as God, Lord, Israel, or David, as a mark of veneration. The Christians followed the practice by contracting their sacred names, such as Jesus and Christos. The great increase in use of abbreviation as a means of saving time and material dates from the 12th century, but some contraction signs are of high antiquity, such as the sign 7 for et (Latin, “and”). Some are quickly written versions of letter groups, such as “÷” for est (Latin, “is”), the top dot standing for e, the bottom dot for t, and the stroke being a long or f-shaped s, fallen on its side. The letter r is often omitted, the adjacent vowel being written above the line, as cata for carta (“charter”). In works for semilearned readers, such as romances, abbreviations are often few, but books produced for the learned, such as university textbooks, are heavily loaded with abbreviations. The number of signs and devices in use by the end of the Middle Ages was enormous. More than 13,000 are listed in the standard work, Adriano Cappelli’s Lexicon Abbreviaturarum (1912).

Dating

Dating of books and documents also offers problems. Even when a precise date is given, the dating system of a given time and a given area must be checked because the year began at different times in different territories, and there were even variations in the same country. Calendar reforms initiated in 1582 by Pope Gregory XIII, for example, were not adopted in Protestant England until 1752. If a year of a monarch’s reign is given as a date, it is necessary to determine whether the reign is counted from his accession or coronation. Moreover, few books were dated, the dated title page being nonexistent in medieval works, though sometimes a final paragraph, the colophon, supplies a date with the scribe’s name and place of work. Important documents, such as English 12th-century royal charters, are undated.

In the absence of dates, inferences are drawn from handwriting, use of abbreviations, and internal evidence. Caution must be used, however; for an elderly scribe may be using a hand learned over half a century before, and work in the same scriptorium or office as a young clerk anxious to show off all the latest tricks and flourishes. Some styles lasted a long time: Caroline minuscule lasted for more than three centuries. Certain kinds of books, such as liturgical volumes, were produced in a highly stylized form for generations, and thus it is often difficult to provide a close date for a late medieval missal (with standard illustrations and marginal decorations) in a mechanical Gothic hand.

Internal evidence must be weighed carefully. A given historical event noted in a chronicle will provide an earliest possible date, unless the entry is an interpolation. Evidence for some legal practice or liturgical usage is no safe guide, for legislation on the subject by a king or a pope may merely be ratification of a long-standing practice.

A paleographer must get to know his scribes, for their mannerisms can be highly informative. Nearly 50 different scribes have been distinguished in the English royal chancery in the period 1100–89. First-rate scribes, such as notaries public, provide much information about themselves, giving their names, notarial signs, and information on their authority to act. Even anonymous clerks, who drew up innumerable property conveyances, can be identified by their script over a period of years, and their career can be traced through developing, mature, and deteriorating handwriting, thereby offering dating evidence.

The provenance (origin) of many manuscripts can be immediately recognized because certain centres developed individual styles. Papal and royal chanceries issued documents of easily identifiable origin, while many monastic scriptoria—for example, that of Canterbury Cathedral in the earlier 12th century—had a virtually private handwriting.

Textual corruptions

Textual corruptions are another obstacle to correct elucidation. A legal document is certain to have been checked at the time of writing, but one cannot be sure in the case of a literary, philosophical, or theological text. Scribes were fallible, and, if there are no signs of any corrections in a text, then it probably embodies inaccuracies. A popular book, such as Chaucer’s works, exists in large numbers of manuscripts, and many manuscripts produce variant readings. If a scribe made a mistake in copying, future scribes using his version are likely to reproduce the error and add others. Sometimes the same muddled passage in a group of manuscripts of a given author can be traced back to damage in an earlier copy, say a section eaten by rodents or impenetrably stained. Whenever copyists worked from different and faulty originals, various copies tend to fall into families. A paleographer must bring together various readings in families and decide which is the best reading.

Sometimes a scribe, set to work because he could write a fine hand, did not necessarily possess much knowledge of the language. Such a scribe faced with a text heavily loaded with abbreviations would usually make nonsense of it. Occasionally, a particularly stupid copyist, faced with a master copy in two columns of writing, would copy straight across the top line, then across the second. When he used a different number of words per line, the text was reduced to unintelligibility. In Greek and Roman times there was the difficulty that texts were written continuously, without space between the words. Copyists misread passages. For instance the historian Tacitus reported that some tribesmen went off to guard their own property: ADSVATVTANDA (ad sua tutanda). Some copyist thought “Suatutanda” was a place and this ghost name was perpetuated in geographical works. Later medieval Gothic hands presented a forest of vertical strokes called minims. The letter v rendered as u made two strokes, while i was often left without a dot or at best with a faint hairline, often misplaced. The group of letters ium could be read, as uim, uiui, niui, mui, miu, with many other variations. Accordingly, minim corruption, confusion of vertical strokes, is a term constantly heard in paleographical circles.

Latin and Greek are inflected languages in which the same case and tense endings constantly occur, offering scope for error. Moreover, in biblical, theological, or philosophical texts, the same words abound. For example, in one place in the Gospel According to John there occurs the passage:

Verba quae ego loquor

vobis a me ipso non loquor

pater autem in me manens…

(“The words that I speak…”). The eye of a sleepy scribe might slip from the first loquor to the second, whereupon he would go on copying at pater autem, leaving out the second line altogether, a common type of error known as homoioteleuton (“like ending”).

Decorations and forgery

Because of the lack of surviving specimens, it is difficult to assess book decoration in classical times, but apparently it was very limited. In the later centuries of the Roman Empire, however, book illustrations were not infrequent. The narrative material in the Bible encouraged illustration. The Irish were foremost in applying decoration to the text in the form of elaboration of capital letters, producing such masterpieces as the Book of Kells (late 7th century), in which Celtic imagination and artistic sense ran riot in elevating the book to an object of outstanding beauty. Some of the greatest creative talent of the Middle Ages was lavished upon books, especially upon those used in worship, such as Bibles, psalters, and missals. When a book cannot be assigned either a date or provenance upon the appearance of the text alone, its style of illumination will often direct the paleographer to a certain monastery in which the carving on capitals or wall paintings may contain the same motifs.

Because of the immensely high prices of manuscripts, the question of forgery naturally arises, but it is safe to say that no modern forgery could survive for a moment. A convincing imitation of ancient script is virtually impossible, while the papyrus, parchment, or paper on which it would be written could not stand up to modern scientific inspection. Anything of recent vegetable or animal origin fluoresces brightly under ultraviolet light, to name but one test. William Henry Ireland (died 1835), the Shakespeare forger, used flyleaves from 16th-century books, but his handwriting and non-Shakespearean language gave him away. A modern would-be forger must either copy an existing work, which, in the present state of art history and paleographical study, would be immediately recognized, or be prepared to invent medieval subject matter.

There was fabrication of documents in medieval times on a considerable scale. A monastery might find itself in possession of estates held since remote antiquity but without any title deeds. When some powerful monarch made difficulties, there was a strong inducement to produce the required ancient-looking documents. The borderline between justifying legitimate possession and culpable attempts to gain extra territory or privileges, however, is ill-defined. Monks occasionally descended to falsifications of title deeds and charters of exemption. About 1125 a monk of Soissons on his deathbed confessed to a career of professional forgery for gain and admitted fabricating charters for various monasteries, including Westminster Abbey. Early forgeries, however, give themselves away through such inconsistencies as mentioning bishops of nonexistent sees or embodying legal phrases that came into use generations later or bearing seals when seals were not yet appended to documents.

The modern paleographer has great technical aids: photography since the 19th century and colour photography in the 20th. Ultraviolet light brings out faded handwriting. Uncertain images can be enhanced using computer software. Microfilm and digital imaging make the contents of a volume in a far-distant repository available quickly and cheaply.